


and when you get scared, just know i'm right here (together)

by tomkitty



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti)
Genre: Don't copy to another site, Everyone lives/Nobody dies, Fix-It
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-02
Updated: 2019-12-02
Packaged: 2021-02-26 05:09:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,085
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21628141
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tomkitty/pseuds/tomkitty
Summary: eddie doesn't die and all the losers make it out of neibolt. sometimes everyone, and i do mean everyone, can get nice things and happy endings.
Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier
Comments: 2
Kudos: 48





	1. we're the losers

**Author's Note:**

> based loosely on this post by slaviceddie on tumblr:
> 
> if you cut That Scene in reverse it rly is richie and the losers fussing over eddie and then eddie waking up, laughing, coughing up blood, and telling a shellshocked richie he fucked his mother. icon
> 
> i don't think this is exactly what they had in mind but i just used it as a baseline

It’s heart pulsed as they all wrapped their hands around it and squeezed. The heart turned to ash and the deadlights faded into darkness. They stood in shock. It was dead. After all that, they were finally able to kill It.

“Eddie,” Richie said, coming out of his shock. “Eddie.”

He ran back towards the alcove where they left him, the rest of them following quickly.

Richie knelt down in front of Eddie. He was slumped over slightly, his eyes shut. He was just resting, he must be in so much pain, Richie thought. 

“Hey, hey Eds we did it. We did it. We killed him. He’s gone.” Richie said smiling at Eddie.

Eddie didn’t respond.

“Eds? Come on Eddie Spaghetti, you can be a bit more enthused about it.” Richie’s voice cracked slightly and he put his hand on Eddie’s face.

Behind him everyone looked pained. “Rich, honey we have to go,” Bev said.

“Hold on, just, we gotta wake Eddie up. He’s resting. You hear that? Bev said we gotta go so come on, wake up.”

“Richie he’s-“

“No! No, don’t you dare finish that sentence! Don’t do it!” Richie reached forward and pulled Eddie towards him, cradling his head against his neck. “He’s just resting! If he can’t get up we gotta, we just gotta carry him out. That’s all. We’ll carry him.”

“Richie we can’t the place is coming down and-“

“No! We have to! I can’t fucking leave him like this! I won’t leave him down here! It’s so dirty and dark he’d hate it! He’ll hate it! We have to get him out. I can’t leave him! I won’t, I won’t do it!” Richie was sobbing now, he wasn’t going to leave Eddie down here. He’d rather die down here with Eddie than leave him behind.

Several gasps were heard behind him and oh, he didn’t realize he said that last bit out loud.

“Okay Rich, okay, we’ll carry him out. But you have to let him go so we can help.” Ben said.

Richie nodded and pulled away. He used one hand to caress Eddie’s cheek. “We’re gonna get you out okay Eds? Don’t worry, I’d never leave you behind.”

Suddenly Eddie coughed. A loud hacking one that caused a bit of blood to spill out of his mouth.

“Eddie!” Richie exclaimed.

Eddie opened his eyes slightly and tried to smile at Richie but it ended up looking more like a grimace. Richie was crying. Why was Richie crying? He shouldn’t be crying. Eddie hated seeing Richie cry, he much preferred it when Richie was smiling and laughing. Richie had a wonderful smile.

“Hey Richie, I gotta tell you something.”

“Anything Eds, what is it?”

“I, I fucked your mom,” Eddie said with a cough. Eddie looked at Richie’s face and watched as Richie looked confused at first. He furrowed his eyebrows and tilted his head but then, Eddie could see it, the amusement beginning to light up Richie’s eyes. The raising of his eyebrows, the twitch of his lips, and then Richie was laughing. Loud and bright, his shoulders shaking with the force of his laugh. It was a bit hysterical but he was no longer crying so Eddie took it as a win.

“Mom jokes are supposed to be my thing Eds,” Richie said, still giggling at Eddie.

Eddie just shrugged, but smiled back at him.

A loud crash startled the group and pulled them all back to reality. The one where It’s lair was crumbling down around them. 

“Okay, time to go!” 

Everyone quickly sprung into action. Richie and Bill both took up one of Eddie’s sides and practically carried him most of the way out of the lair, once they had to start climbing though things got a bit more difficult. In the end they ended up strapping Eddie to Ben’s back using their jackets and some rope while Eddie did his best to hang on for dear life. Ben then climbed up and out with Mike, Bill, and Richie spotting him from behind in case Eddie fell.

They ran out of Neibolt house just in time for the thing to collapse in on itself. Almost immediately everyone was on Eddie. They unstrapped him from Ben’s back and Richie was the first to start fussing over him.

“We need another jacket! We have to keep applying pressure!” Richie said even as he pressed his soaked through jacket against Eddie stomach and tried to use his hand to apply pressure to Eddie’s back.

“Rich.”

“Don’t worry Eds, we’ll get you to the hospital in time.”

“No, that’s not-”

“Bill give me your shirt! Eddie needs it more than you!”

“Y-yeah sure,” Bill said as he began pulling off his shirt.

“No wait-”

“Bev can you call an ambulance? Eddie needs to be seen to immediately.”

“Okay Rich, I’ll try,” Bev said pulling her phone out of her pocket and wondering if it would still work after being so thoroughly soaked.

“Guys hold on-”

“Mike could you and Ben-”

“BEEP BEEP RICHIE!” Eddie shouted.

Everyone stopped and stared at Eddie.

“Do I have your attention now? Good. As I was trying to say, I think I’m okay guys. I don’t, it doesn’t hurt anymore.”

“You can’t feel it?!” Richie yelled. “That’s a bad thing! That’s a bad sign isn’t it? We need to get you to the hospital immediately!”

Richie tried to pick Eddie up, as if he was going to carry Eddie himself all the way to the hospital, but Eddie just slapped his hands away.

“Do not fucking touch me! Will you just listen to me for five seconds fucknuts! I’m saying I think the wound is gone! I don’t even feel it!” And to prove his point Eddie shoved the jacket away, pulled up his shirt, and sure enough the wound was gone. It was as though Eddie hadn’t been stabbed at all. 

“What? How! I saw, we all saw when It stabbed you. How can it just be gone? Is it, is this a trick?” Richie asked as his hand hovered above Eddie’s torso, wanting to touch to make sure what he was seeing was real but being scared of actually placing his hand on Eddie’s skin.

Eddie reached up and used his hand to press Richie’s hand against his skin. “It’s really gone Richie. There’s no wound.”

The rest of the losers rushed forward then, all of them kneeling around Eddie, checking him over and running their hands over his stomach and back. Sure enough there were no wounds there. 

“I think, for a moment there I thought I was dead.” Eddie said and everyone froze. “It was like I was floating in this vast space, nothing hurt and my wounds were gone. I think, I think Stan was there.”

“Stan?” Bill asked.

“Yeah, there was a man and I didn’t really recognize him at first but it was more like a feeling. I could feel that it was Stan. That it was his presence that was there with me. He’s really sorry, I could feel his guilt. He hates himself for being so weak.”

Richie shook his head. “No, he wasn’t weak. I shouldn’t have said that. I was just upset that he wasn’t here.”

“What happened after that Eddie?” Ben asked.

“There was this weird encompassing feeling. It wasn’t bad, it felt safe, like someone holding you and saying everything was going to be okay. For some reason there was an image of a turtle.” Eddie shook his head. “And then I woke up and Richie was crying and somehow I just knew it was because of me.” 

Eddie reached up and place a hand on Richie’s cheek. He smiled at him before pulling him in for a hug. Everyone else piled onto them then. One big group hug right there in the middle of the road, in front of the ruined remains of the Neibolt house.


	2. and we're winnin'

In the end they ended up back at the town house where everyone got cleaned up. It was decided that Eddie would treated all their minor wounds, just like how he used to when they were kids, only, after all the dirt, grime, and blood was washed away, all their wounds were gone. Even the ones inflicted on them by Bowers. Even the scars on their hands, the one from the blood oath they made as kids, those were gone as well.

They decided to stay in Derry after that. Not for long, but they decided that they’d all stay while Mike got everything together. They weren’t going to leave him behind again. Even with It dead they were scared of forgetting each other again so they made plans. They traded all their contact information, made sure all their social media was linked to each other, left notes on their phones, computers, and papers that they left tucked into their belongings.

They helped each other in planning what was next.

The first thing Beverly would do was divorce her awful husband and take back her own name. She knew the legal battle with their company would be hard but she was willing to let it go and start from scratch if it meant being free of him.

Then she would move in with Ben. With everything that happened and all the memories that came back, they knew they loved each other and Ben was more than happy to be with Bev again.

Bill would finish writing the new ending of the movie and then email it to the director. Then he would be getting in touch with Audra where he’d accept her proposal for a divorce. They had been having problems for a while if he was being honest and while they had been trying to work through them he knew Audra was getting tired of all the fighting and she was just waiting for Bill to see it too.

Mike was working with the city to find a new replacement librarian and he was working on making sure everything was ready for the next person to come in. Mostly all he needed to do was pack up his things and tie up a few loose ends with the city. After that he would be able to leave with Bill who was looking for a place down in Florida where they could stay for a while.

The first thing Eddie did was toss out all his medication. Then he went back and gathered them up because withdrawal was real and he knew quitting cold turkey wouldn’t be easy. Instead he made plans to see his doctor in order to figure out which ones he really did or didn’t need and to help wean him off the ones he had essentially been abusing all these years. Next he decided to divorce Myra. He didn’t love her and the realization that he essentially married his mother was horrifying and he wanted to get out of that relationship immediately. 

It was his job that was bothering him though. While he wasn’t exactly happy being a risk analyst, he couldn’t lie that making six figures a year was well worth it since he wasn’t struggling financially. He’d have to consider what to do about that later, especially since Richie was LA-based and Eddie really didn’t want to leave him.

Fortunately Richie had a solution for that. Being a comedian Richie could live practically anywhere since he spent most of his time travelling for shows anyway. Richie proposed that they could live wherever Eddie wanted, he’d even move to New York just so Eddie could keep his job. Eddie still wasn’t sure about his job but he was glad that Richie was willing to be so flexible for him.

Speaking of touring, the first thing Richie did was call up his manager and cancel the rest of his tour. If he had to tell another one of the shitty jokes that were written for him he was going to lose his mind. He wasn’t going to hide anymore. He’d go back to writing his own material and if people didn’t like it, well, fuck it. He’d build a new fanbase. He could start from scratch. As long as he had his friends on his side he’d be okay.

It was after that first week that it happened. Everyone had gotten their plans into motion, divorce papers had been sent, calls had been made, and everyone was at the town house hanging in the sitting room after a long day. Bev laying sideways on the couch, leaning against Ben, her feet propped up in Richie’s lap. Richie with one arm around Eddie who had his feet tucked up under him on the couch, and the other resting on Bev’s legs. Mike and Bill were curled up against each other on the love seat, Bill fitting perfectly against Mike’s side. 

As it turned out, no one did work there. Not really. It was owned by the city but strangely fell under the jurisdiction of the library. When they found that out everyone looked at Mike who just shrugged and smiled, saying there were perks to living in this town for so long.

It was as they were all sitting and discussing their progress that it happened. They heard the front door open and two sets of feet walk inside. Just as Mike was about to get up the newcomers turned the corner.

A woman and a man stood in front of them but everyone zeroed in on the man. He was tall with dark brown curls and glasses. He was smartly dressed in a dark green button down tucked into khaki slacks with a brown belt and he was wearing a dark blue cardigan of all things. On his feet were a pair of sensible shoes.

Eddie was the first to leap up off the couch, running full tilt at the man even as he yelled out, “Stan!”

Stan barely held his balance as Eddie wrapped him into a hug and then he lost his balance completely as only a second later the rest of the group were up, various exclamations of his name falling from their lips, and tackling Stan to the floor in a huge pile.

“How are you here?!”

“You scared us!”

“What the fuck Stan!”

“We thought you were dead!”

“It’s been a week! What happened?”

“We’ve missed you!”

Everyone was shouting and talking over each other at once but most importantly they were all crying. Crying because they thought Stan was dead but he was here in front of them, alive and well.

“I’m so sorry you guys. I was just so scared. It got to me. I wish I hadn’t been so weak but-”

“No shut up,” Richie said cutting him off, still feeling guilty over what he said. “You’re not weak okay. You’re not. Just because It got to you first doesn’t make you weak. It almost got to all of us. Do you know how many times I almost up and left this place? You’re stronger than you think Stan.”

Stan shook his head. “I took the easy way out. I knew I wouldn’t be able to walk back into that house again. I would have held you all back so I took myself out of the equation.”

“Don’t you dare say that Stan okay,” Bev said, tears falling from her eyes. “I saw what happened. What you did? That was not easy. You were scared and you had every right to be. All of us were terrified, but you had more reason to be scared than all of us.”

“That’s right,” Eddie said as he remembered. “You were the only one of us who had ever been directly attacked and fed off of by It. You all remember right? That day when Stan got separated from all of us? It got to you first because it knew you best. It fed off your fear that day and that’s the only reason why it went after you first. It doesn’t make you weak.”

Bev gasped suddenly. “The deadlights. When It was feeding off you, you were trapped in the deadlights weren’t you?”

“Yeah,” Stan said with a swallow. “I was. It showed me things, horrible things. I saw all of us as we are now, I saw each and every one of us die, me most of all. I never forgot. Not really. I’ve seen Richie’s comedy act, I’ve read all of Bill’s books, and I even own some things from your clothing line. I never forgot any of you. But at the same time I was too scared to reach out and try to contact any of you. Not after seeing all of you die. I’m so sorry.”

“Stan, the fact that you lived so long with that w-weight on you just proves how st-strong you are.” Bill said as he earnestly looked into Stan’s eyes. “T-trust us okay? We don’t, we could n-n-never blame you. We l-love you St-Stan.”

There were agreements all around. Everyone stated how much they loved Stan and Stan couldn’t help it as his eyes filled with tears, happy ones this time.

“I love you guys too,” Stan said and they all pressed closer as they hugged each other. “I wanted to show up sooner, but it wasn’t the right time yet,” Stan said with an apologetic shrug.

“W-what do you mean?” Bill asked.

They all turned as they heard the door open again. They heard heels clicking against the ground and a voice call out. “Bill Denbrough where are you!”

Bill recognized the voice immediately and ducked his head down into his pile of friends to hide. 

“Bill I know you’re here! What is the meaning of-oh!” A woman that everyone immediately recognized as actress Audra Phillips, with her red hair and grey eyes, rounded the corner and came to a stop, looking first at the pile of people laying on the ground and then up at the woman standing next to the group.

From his spot on the ground Stan smiled and nudged Bill to look up. This was what Stan had unknowingly been waiting for.

They all watched as Audra’s eyes widened as she looked at the other woman. Audra was speechless and she took in the woman’s long dark hair, short stature, and soft brown eyes.

“Patty?” 

The woman, Patty, glanced back at Stan who just nodded at her encouragingly. 

“Hi Auddy,” Patty said almost shyly. “It’s been a long time hasn’t it?” 

And it had been a long time. Patricia Blum hadn’t thought of Audra Phillips, the one she knew in college, for years now. Not past seeing her in a movie or ad anyway. She certainly hadn’t thought of the months they spend getting to know each other or the stolen kisses they shared when they were alone. They were just curious college kids then, it wasn’t meant to mean anything. That’s what Patty told herself anyway.

What they say about never forgetting your first love is true, and Audra felt like she was being hit by a truck as she looked at Patricia Blum. Older now but still absolutely breathtaking to look at. The shy jewish girl who was scared of being gay but still gave in for Audra. At least she had until Audra got her first filming gig and moved out to LA, leaving Patty behind. 

“Yeah, yeah it has been,” Audra said even as she walked forward and pulled Patty into a hug. “Wow, you look amazing. How have you been?”

“I’ve been good. Happy. I’ve seen some of the movies you’ve been it. Even the scary ones, they’re really great. I knew you’d be a big star one day.”

“Yeah, you told me that all the time.” She pulled back from the hug but ran her hands down Patty’s arms and took her hands into her own. “You were right.” 

They smiled at each other for a moment longer before Audra’s eyes drifted back to the pile of people on the ground where she spotted Bill.

“You! What was the meaning of that email? You’ve been trying to push off getting divorced for months, saying we could work through it, and right when I think we could possibly be getting somewhere with that new couples therapist I get an email from you saying I’m right and we should go through with the divorce?” Audra yelled. She glanced at Patty and then back to Bill. 

“Not that I don’t think we should still get divorced, I do think we should but, what the fuck happened to make you suddenly agree? I know we don’t work as a couple but, dammit Bill we’re still friends aren’t we? You abruptly leave set and then a few days later we get a script with a new ending, it was actually pretty great by the way, and then I received this email from you? Is everything okay?”

“I think we should all probably go back to the sitting room if we’re going to discuss this.” Bev said as she began untangling herself from her friends and stood up.

“Beverly Rogan?” 

“It’s Marsh now, actually, or it will be soon. I’ve decided to get a divorce.”

“Oh thank god,” Audra said. At Bev’s confused expression Audra quickly explained herself. “It’s just, I’ve met Tom Rogan a few times and honestly he just seemed like an awful person and I know it’s none of my business but I’ve seen the way you two were at events. To say that I was a bit worried would be an understatement.”

Bev nodded in understanding. “You’re right. He was awful, but it’s okay because I’m leaving him for good.”

“Good.”

The group then moved to the sitting room and to see who sat with whom was interesting to say the least. Ben, Bev, Richie, and Eddie went back to the couch they were sitting on, Bill and Mike made their way back to the love seat but this time they shoved Stan between the two of them, and, after another encouraging smile from Stan, Patty pulled Audra over to the other love seat and sat next to her, keeping their hands entwined.

The explanation about what went on the past few days was something else to say the least. The losers started with explaining what happened to them as kids to Patty and Audra who sat in shocked silence. Next up the losers caught Stan up on everything that happened with It, the artifacts, the failed ritual, and then how they finally killed it by essentially bullying it to make it feel small.

Patty then explained how she had found Stan dead but when she tried to call the police for help they insisted that Stan wasn’t dead, just in a coma. They hadn’t been able to see all the blood. Despite what Patty said they insisted on hooking him up to life support and Patty relented because what else was she supposed to do? She explained how it had been sitting in that hospital room, how difficult it was, because all she could hear was a flatline on the monitor, but then out of nowhere it started beeping with signs of a pulse. Soon after that Stan woke up and after they talked it out they made plans to come here to Derry.

“You said earlier, that you wanted to come sooner but didn’t because it wasn’t the right time?” Mike asked. “What did you mean by that?”

“It wasn’t the right time yet. Somehow I just knew that if we left any earlier than we did it wouldn’t have been the right time. I didn’t know the details but I knew it had something to do with Patty that would make her happy,” Stan gestured to Audra who was still holding Patty’s hand, “and I was right.”

In the end everything worked out. When they finally left Derry no one forgot each other this time. Audra and Bill divorced, as did Patty and Stan, and Audra and Patty got together again. Stan, Bill, and Mike were happy together, balancing each other out perfectly. Ben and Bev found comfort and happiness in each other, as they always should have been able to. Richie and Eddie moved in together and were actually the first of everyone to get married.

After spending years apart, the losers were back together again. They were still standing and from now on would always be there for each other.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> of course i had to bring back stan. if i'm bringing back eddie then dammit stan gets to come back too. it's not a happy ending unless ALL the losers are present and accounted for thank you very much.
> 
> also i couldn't just leave audra and patty out. when i said everyone gets a happy ending then i mean everyone. was it rushed maybe, but whatever, i don't care how i got there i just did it.


End file.
